


Hair-raising Escapades (Electronic and Otherwise)

by notaverse



Series: Transjinder [5]
Category: Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Multi, Transgender, uke!Jin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-30
Updated: 2011-09-30
Packaged: 2017-10-24 05:02:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/259295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notaverse/pseuds/notaverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nakamaru plays hairdresser, Koki doesn't get a stripper for his birthday, Kame's new drama role requires him to master the art of social networking and Jin gains a follower.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hair-raising Escapades (Electronic and Otherwise)

**Author's Note:**

> **Title:** Hair-raising Escapades (Electronic and Otherwise)  
>  **Fandom:** KAT-TUN  
>  **Pairing:** Kame/Jin  
>  **Rating:** PG  
>  **Genre:** Kind of AU  
>  **Disclaimer:** Not mine, damnit

Kame doesn't expect Jin to kiss him back. He's wrong, and he doesn't know if it's the alcohol or the intensity of the situation or Jin just being Jin and going with the flow, but for an all too fleeting moment, he receives the response he's always hoped for. It's sloppy and sweet and urgent all at once, Jin's lips sweet with mango, parting for him, welcoming him in.

And then it's over, and Jin's fingers unclench and push him away.

"You're going to bed," he tells Kame shakily, taking a step backwards. "Alone."

 _I'm always alone_ , Kame thinks. He lies in bed and listens to Jin making up the couch in the next room. Jin must be lonely too.

\-----

The dull ache in Kame's head owes more to his run-in with the car doorframe than the two bottles of wine, but that's poor consolation when he wakes alone, embarrassed and sore, blinking at the sun streaming in past curtains he'd forgotten to close. He checks his watch. It's already ten, which means it's a damned good thing he doesn't have to be anywhere until three. It's going to take him that long to feel human again.

He rolls out of bed still half-dressed from the night before; even the slightest movement sets off explosions in his head and he's none too steady when his feet hit the ground. He's about as far from the perfect idol as he can get right now.

Jin's _never_ the perfect idol - but from the sounds coming through the wall, he's making coffee, and that makes him perfect as far as Kame's concerned.

"You're still here," Kame says as he staggers into the kitchen. "And awake. I didn't expect that."

"I'm here," Jin says, "but I'm not sure about the awake part. Can I get back to you on that?"

Kame waves vaguely at him and goes in search of painkillers. "Take your time..."

It's a late breakfast of pills and black coffee for them both, accompanied by much clutching of heads. It takes a little while for the night to come back to Kame. Wine. An education in the art of being a fake girl. Bad bilingual puns. More wine. Jin wanting to leave. Koki to the rescue. No more wine. Water trickling down Kame's chin. Jin's snowflake sweater with the too-long sleeves that make him look all of three years old. A touch of lips, and fingers on hips, and a moment Kame hopes Jin won't remember.

"I might be awake now," Jin says when he's on his second cup and starting to look less like a corpse. "I've stopped seeing double."

"You were only seeing double? Lucky." Kame hadn't realised he was seeing triple until he missed his coffee cup twice. But that's worn off now and the only thing in his vision is Jin.

It's a pleasant sight, because Jin's laughing, and that always makes Kame feel like everything's right with the world - even if the laughter is at _his_ expense. "You were so out of it last night - I'm amazed you can see at all!"

"I can see," Kame huffs, pretending to be offended. He still feels too zombie-like to be playful but he doesn't want to do anything weird that might remind Jin of last night. In fact, if they can avoid the subject altogether, that would be preferable. "Well enough to know you're not much better off."

"We were both pretty far gone." Jin shuffles his cup from hand to hand. "I'm not even sure what I was saying by the end of it."

Is that supposed to be a cue, Kame wonders? He's a good actor. He can follow directions. "I remember getting in Koki's car and that's about it," he says, hoping that's what Jin wants to hear. It's hard to read him right now.

He must be interpreting correctly, because Jin looks relieved. "Yeah, I didn't want to risk a taxi when you looked like you were going to throw up. You know it would've ended up in Friday."

"Koki would've done a lot worse if it had been in his car."

"Not if it's you," Jin says. "You could probably kill someone in Koki's car and he'd swear you were in another prefecture at the time."

"Possibly, but let's hope I never have to find out."

Kame genuinely doesn't remember much about the car ride, but he can rely on Koki to tell him if he said or did anything strange. Koki understands. Koki's seen him at his worst.

It's the part after he got home that worries him. Kissing Jin has been on his to-do list for years, but on the portion of the list that deals with things he'd like to do but knows are out of his reach, like playing professional baseball. That part of the list is mercifully short, because he's good at turning his dreams into reality. This dream, though...this one's about more than just him, and Jin doesn't need any added confusion in his life right now.

"Thanks for last night," Jin says when he's drained his cup. "It was...educational. I don't think I'll be going back for another lesson, though. Not my kind of place."

"Not enough noise, smoke, and scantily-clad girls for you," Kame says. "I could take you to a women-only club two doors down from that one but we'd both have to go in drag."

Jin smiles and lights his first cigarette of the morning - one of Kame's, because the pack's closer. "I'd rather go to Lex. At least I can relax there."

Kame finds he tends to get lost in the crowd of tall foreigners on the rare occasions when he ventures into Lex (always someone else's idea) but it's the perfect place for Jin, always a mix of different nationalities, ages and ideas. Tiny Japanese women in traditional garb dance alongside strapping Europeans in their tank tops; brash American girls cut loose next to shy Japanese guys. Jin fits right in, somewhere in the middle - mixed-up, muddled-up, shining in the heart of the world.

"You should go to places where you can relax," Kame says. "I've dragged you to enough where you can't."

"Come with me sometime and get a taste of your own medicine."

Kame salutes him with a coffee cup and goes to take a shower. Jin tastes much sweeter than medicine, and Kame wants another dose.

\-----

By the time three o'clock rolls around, Kame's clean, dressed, and ready to embrace the fabulously shiny life of an idol. Jin had vanished while he was still in the shower, yelling out "Ciao!" as he left. Kame thinks he must've been a sight and hopes no one managed to snap a picture. They have to be so careful all the time, doubly so if they're spotted in the vicinity of each other's homes, and both of them woke up looking the worse for wear.

But no longer, because Kame's got a shoot for _Popolo_ and he has to look perfect - worthy of a few fangirl screams, at least. Even though it's November they're outdoors, wearing light jackets as they model late autumn chic and try to ignore the cold breeze that blows through the park. Kame sits on the see-saw with Ueda and remembers a time when it would've been Jin on the other end.

"How's your head?" Koki asks when they have a minute to themselves. "Do you even remember last night?"

"It's okay as long as I don't move too fast," Kame says. "And yeah, I remember. Thanks for picking us up."

"No problem." Koki gives him a supportive smile, the one that always makes him feel grateful to have such a wonderful bunch of people around him. They can't get together without making fun of each other and they're not a hand-holding kind of group, but that's part of what makes them a family. "Did he have fun?"

"A little. It's not really his kind of place."

"Is it yours?"

"My place is..." Kame returns Koki's smile with a secretive one of his own, "on the pitcher's mound. Not stuck indoors somewhere."

"Then tell him he looks cute in a uniform and start recruiting for your own LGBT baseball team."

Not for the first time, Kame wonders how much Koki actually knows. He's never formally come out to any of them, except in interviews where the subject's treated as a joke, but he's never deliberately concealed it from them, either. As with his blood family, he figured he'd tell them if he ever got seriously involved enough with anyone to warrant it. They keep enough of a distance from each other that they rarely know what's going on to that extent. He finds out more from the gossip magazines than he does from his bandmates and no one's ever asked him straight out.

Kame's preferences are nobody else's business - but last night, he'd tried to make them Jin's. That's something he hopes Koki _doesn't_ know.

"I'm not sure that's the kind of image he wants to promote, but you can always suggest it tomorrow."

Koki's filming a drama special all weekend, and he's spending Saturday night - his birthday - with his family, but Kame has claimed the Friday night, if only for a little while. He's got a chocolate cake recipe from his sister-in-law that he's dying to try out, and nobody's leaving his apartment unless they've had a slice. He wouldn't normally bake the cake himself, but he really wants to do something a little more personal for Koki as a token of his thanks. Valentine's Day is far enough that the birthday boy will hopefully not get the wrong idea.

"I'm liable to end up with cake all over my face if I try," Koki says.

"He wouldn't waste perfectly good cake on you."

"Only because you'd kill him if he got any crumbs on your pristine floors."

Kame concedes that Koki might have a point, and makes a mental note to leave his vacuum cleaner in plain sight as a warning to any potential messy eaters. It's not like it's going to be a full-blown party, merely an hour or two snatched from their schedules to get together and celebrate, but he's looking forward to it. It's been a while since all six of them have met up and the pirate ship _Queen KAT-TUN_ is missing her princess.

\-----

Nakamaru's used to receiving drunken phone calls from Jin at all sorts of hours, depending on where in the world he happens to be at the time, and mostly they cover the same sort of ground. Girls, or lack thereof. Badly-disguised homesickness. The future of rap music. Strange new English slang. Why wearing argyle only attracts old ladies.

He's not, however, used to receiving phone calls about braids. Moreover, Jin sounds entirely sober, if somewhat agitated.

"You remember when we were suffering in Hokkaido for _Cartoon KAT-TUN_?"

"I suffer whenever I'm sent anywhere with you," Nakamaru says. "Sunshine or snow."

"I make your life more challenging. Think of it as me doing you a favour."

"Your kind of favours, I don't need." Nakamaru sighs, resigning himself to not finishing his essay before he has to leave for Kame's place. "So what about Hokkaido?"

"Remember the girls who plaited my hair?"

"The same ones who wanted to _cut_ my hair?"

"Those girls, yeah," Jin says. "You watched the whole time; do you remember how they started off? I've been thinking I'd like to do that with my hair again."

It's not a look Nakamaru could manage to pull off himself - even if he had enough hair - but it works for Jin. It works for Kame, too, but Kame's not happy unless he changes his hair every five minutes and it takes time to style it that way.

Time Nakamaru has, if he leaves the essay till tomorrow and goes to Jin's place for some emergency hairdressing. "Fine, I'll do it."

"You'll do it?"

"Sisters," Nakamaru says darkly, and Jin understands. "I'll come over now, but you owe me a couple of hours of study time, all right? I've got an exciting English text on deforestation that I'm sure you can't wait to get your hands on."

He says "deforestation" in English, and Jin repeats it slowly back to him. "Defenestration?"

"No, _deforestation_. I'm not studying the science of throwing things out of windows!"

"You'll get a better grade without me," Jin says, nonchalant as ever. "But come over anyway."

That's probably true, because Jin's study habits are nothing if not irregular, but Nakamaru's going to hold him to it anyway. "Just make sure you've got enough hair accessories."

Fifteen minutes later Jin answers the door with damp hair, dressed in jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt. The shirt's plain, and it's just a regular V-neck, but it clings like a second skin and Nakamaru has a moment of confusion trying to figure out if it's a girl's top or not. Maybe it just looks that way because it's Jin wearing it, he's not sure. It might look totally masculine on Koki.

"Are you going to come in or do I have to stand here and freeze in the doorway while you make up your mind?"

Startled, Nakamaru steps inside and arranges his boots neatly by the door. "Don't bully the guy who's here to help you, or I'll leave you half-done."

"Then I'll tweet about my incompetent hairdresser with the big nose and everyone on the Internet will know-"

"All right!" Nakamaru holds up his hands in defeat. The last thing he needs is Jin's army of Twitter followers sending him hate mail. "Your hair had better be clean."

"I washed it half an hour ago." Jin breaks into a smirk. "I think I've got some gloves around here somewhere if you don't trust me, though."

Trust isn't an issue; never has been, no matter how it looks on TV. Nakamaru will always say he's afraid Jin will push him into swimming pools and off buildings, but the truth is that Jin will never deliberately do anything to hurt him. Their relationship is all about give and take, and when Jin takes too many liberties, Nakamaru turns and punches him. It's a good system. They might both be closer to thirty than twenty but they're still a pair of elementary school kids when they squabble and bully each other, and Jin knows exactly how much he can get away with before he gets pushed back.

Not that this ever stops him from pushing in the first place. He needs the attention, only sometimes the attention he gets is not the kind he wants.

What he's getting now is to his liking, though. Nakamaru makes him throw a towel over his shoulders so he doesn't end up with a million loose hairs clinging to his shirt, and there's an awkward moment while they try to figure out the best angle of approach. They're the same height, so Jin has to sit down for this, eventually settling himself on the floor, in front of the couch and between Nakamaru's legs. A pile of hairbands, some slides and a rat-tail comb sit next to them on the coffee table.

"This is going to hurt a bit," Nakamaru says. "Unless you want very loose braids."

"I can take it," Jin assures him. "I've survived worse for work."

They both have. Nakamaru grimaces, thinking of the torture he's undergone over the years in the name of entertainment. It's hard having a reputation as a coward, and part of it is Jin's fault. Revenge is easy to come by, though - the shirt leaves Jin's ticklish collarbones exposed.

It takes a few minutes to comb out the tangles from Jin's damp hair. He manages to hold himself still throughout, though Nakamaru suspects it won't last. Jin will turn his head to talk, and he'll feel the pull on his scalp. There's no way he can remain silent the entire time.

It's a slow business. Nakamaru isolates a chunk of hair at the front, separating it out into three sections and braiding it till he reaches the end, tying it off with an elastic band. He'll bunch them all together later.

One down; many more to go. Good thing Jin's hair isn't too much past his shoulders right now, and he's not doing all of it - the lower half's staying loose.

"Can I see?"

"There's not much to see yet," Nakamaru says. "The longer you stop to preen, the less time we've got."

"I don't preen; I just want to check you're doing it right."

"How would you know if I wasn't?"

Jin shuts up.

It's a strange situation. Nakamaru's grateful that Jin hasn't made the obligatory joke about having a man between his legs, but maybe he's saving it for afterwards because he knows it'll only make things awkward to say it now. It's already uncomfortable, touching Jin like this - too close, too intimate. Even in Johnny's, men don't make a habit of this, not once their slender childish bodies thicken with maturity and they grow up enough to know some things are better left to the girls.

But maybe that's not how Jin sees himself now. Or maybe he's still the same spoilt brat, convincing people to do him favours and making them love him for his cheek. They're all weak against Jin, which is why, despite his better judgement, Nakamaru volunteered himself for this. They still see each other socially from time to time, but they haven't been alone for ages, not since before Jin "came out". They need the time. Nakamaru can't make sense of this if he doesn't have it, can't make those mental adjustments that will allow him to magically understand how Jin's brain works.

Another couple of braids down the line and Jin's still silent. It's not one of those comfortable silences, either, where neither of them needs to talk because they have this perfect harmony. It's not even one of those painful silences, like the kind they used to have before Jin left for LA the first time and couldn't talk to anyone.

This one's just...awkward. It's a bump in the road - though not an insurmountable one - and they don't have Kame to drive them straight over it this time. Kame doesn't stop, goes full speed ahead. Nakamaru's more cautious.

"Can you tilt your head to the right a bit?" he asks. It's a poor attempt at conversation but a necessary one. "I'm trying to get these to go round the side."

Jin accidentally tilts to the left instead; without thinking, Nakamaru taps him on the shoulder to make him move. Unfortunately his eyes are on the hair so his aim's a little off, and it's not until he hears Jin squawk and scramble away that he realises he's brushed the forbidden zone.

"Don't!" Jin half-laughs, half-gasps, hands crossed protectively over his collarbones. "You know that tickles!"

He's a ridiculous sight, kneeling on the carpet with partially braided hair, a little kid squirming to get away from tickling fingers, and Nakamaru can't suppress a laugh as he makes his apology. It was an honest mistake, after all. Jin reluctantly crawls back into position, though not without the odd suspicious glare, and the session resumes.

It's easier now they've shared a laugh. Jin hits a remote and kicks off one of his weird and wonderful playlists, covering everything from Eminem to _Miss Saigon_ , and they sing along where they can, fake it where they can't. Nakamaru thinks his impromptu beatbox remix of 'Bass Go Boom' sounds much better than the original. Jin almost clocks him in the jaw, flinging his arms high as he wails his way through 'A Whole New World'.

They duet on 'Lose Yourself' and Nakamaru is reminded of stage lights and grey suits, Jin's American friend lurking on the side. A simpler time, in some ways.

'Lose Yourself' is followed by 'Love Yourself', and Jin sings loud enough to make up for all the concerts where he never got to perform it - concerts he'd thought they'd have, all six of them together, until business got in the way.

"I didn't realise you liked it so much," Nakamaru says.

"It's not such a bad way to go out. Better than the next song you released. What was with that?"

"We thought we'd better pick something you wouldn't want to sing in a million years, so you wouldn't feel bad about us releasing it without you."

Jin turns around, wincing because Nakamaru's still holding a clump of his hair. "Really?"

It's a joke, but Nakamaru doesn't have it in him to extinguish the stars in Jin's eyes. "Nobody said it outright, but I think that's what we were all thinking back then. I know I was."

"You're all a bunch of saps," Jin says happily, turning back before his hair is ripped out by the roots.

"I don't think you're in any position to talk." Nakamaru braids another few turns. "I've seen your Twitter."

"I'm just trying to be in tune with my largely female fanbase. Girls like to hear things about love, right?"

Nakamaru shrugs. "The ones I meet always seem to be more interested in food." He really has to stop letting Massu set him up. "Aren't you supposed to be the expert in how girls think?"

"If I knew how to understand girls, I wouldn't have been single for the best part of a year."

"No, I meant because you're...uh..."

" _Oh._ " Jin drags the word out. "But I don't think any differently to how I always have; it's not like I've suddenly gained this mysterious insight into what makes women tick."

"But you must've started thinking differently somewhere along the line." Nakamaru's desperate to understand this now. Maybe if Jin can present him with a neat, logical explanation for it all, he'll finally be able to wrap his head around it and stop burying his head in the sand. Jin and logic are not the best of friends, because he has his own unique view of the universe and it works the way he wants it to, but there has to be something there that he can rationalise. "You didn't always want to be a girl, did you?"

"I don't want to be a girl _now_ , thanks. One of my exes used to punch me in the stomach when her cramps got really bad, so I could be a good boyfriend and share her pain. Can you picture me dealing with that once a month? Or childbirth?"

Nakamaru tries to picture it but it's too horrible to contemplate. "You don't have the guts to be a real girl. But even if you had surgery, you wouldn't have to deal with any of that."

"I know, but that still doesn't mean I want to change who I am."

It's on the tip of Nakamaru's tongue to ask, "Who are you?", because he's not sure he knows anymore, but it's not like he _doesn't_ know Jin either. This isn't some stranger sitting before him with his hair half-done. This is a friend he's known for years, watched rise from cocky, confident brat set on stardom right through to the more reserved but no less determined man he's become. They've all changed a lot since they first met - mellowed, matured with experience - but he doesn't think he's changed at the core, and maybe Jin hasn't either.

"Would you?" he asks, knowing it's a clumsy question. "If you could? If you could make that part of you not exist?"

Jin scratches the back of his head, accidentally catching one of the bands with his ring and pulling it loose so the plait begins to unravel. "I don't...I don't know. If you'd asked me a few days ago I'd have said yes immediately. My life would be so much easier if I didn't have to deal with all these feelings I have no clue what to do with.

"But I guess everyone's got their own problems, and if I didn't have this, I'd have something else."

"A few days ago? Has something changed?"

Jin turns around just enough to give him an odd smile - bashful, but full of secrets. "I'm learning some interesting things."

He won't elaborate. They return to singing without pausing to make conversation, and Nakamaru strives to finish his task before they have to leave for Kame's. Work goes faster when Jin keeps still. Nakamaru braids from the front and sides, leaving the lower half of Jin's hair free, then takes the collection of tiny braids and pulls them together with shiny brown hair clips - one on each side, and one looped at the top. It's not exactly how he remembers it, but then he tries not to remember that trip if he can help it because it really was tough work in freezing conditions. It's close enough; it'll do. It's not like anyone's going to care, since it's just going to be the six of them and nobody's likely to take much interest in Jin's hair.

Except Jin himself, of course, but even he seems satisfied, smiling as he looks in the mirror. "Good job. Thanks for that; I owe you one."

"You owe me two hours of study time," Nakamaru corrects him. "And you're welcome."

"On that forest thing. Sure, whatever."

Nakamaru sighs and hopes his grades can survive Jin's assistance. If he hurries home now he can maybe put in another half-hour on his essay.

Jin has other ideas. "Let me show you something."

He crosses the room and flips open his laptop, bringing it out of standby. There are a dozen tabs open in the browser but Jin navigates instead to a folder of pictures, which he has to open with a password. Magazine photos, screencaps from old skits, even the odd backstage photo taken when they were messing around at concerts. The pictures are from different times, different places. The one thing they all have in common? Jin, dressed as a girl.

"You keep a folder of pics of yourself in drag?" Nakamaru can't hide his surprise. He can see why it's locked, though.

"You asked me when I started thinking differently," Jin says. "Well, these are the reason."

"This was all for work; we all did it. Even I did it, and I make a horrible girl." Nakamaru thinks he's been scarred for life by that awful _Tokimeki Memorial_ shoot they had to do - though seeing Jin as Hermione Granger comes a close second.

"That's why it was okay back then - we all had to do it. It was embarrassing, but..." Jin pauses to take a deep breath and let it out slowly, like he's trying to give himself time to think, so Nakamaru doesn't rush him, just nods his head and makes noises in the right places. "I didn't care. It was dumb and embarrassing and I got paid.

"And then...you remember Jimmy Mackey? We went to a bar the night before he left for America, and of course he asked how work was going. So I told him, and he...he just gave me this look, like I must've been out of my mind but he was too nice to say so outright."

Nakamaru remembers Jimmy, can picture him towering over the rest, being one of the biggest dorks despite looking so much older thanks to his American blood. It's been a long time since he saw him last, though, outside of photos from mutual friends.

"I asked him what was with the look," Jin continues, "so he asked didn't I find it weird that we were _still_ dressing up like girls for work, even though we weren't little kids anymore. And I didn't know how to answer him, because I hadn't even thought about it. It was just work, and it had never occurred to me to say, 'No, I don't want to wear dresses anymore'."

"You put up a fight about everything else," Nakamaru says fondly. KAT-TUN's history is littered with protests and acts of rebellion.

"That made me think maybe I should be worrying about it, because yeah, past twenty, legally a man, and still dressing up like a girl? And not finding it strange at all?"

"You made a very pretty girl," Nakamaru says. "Everyone thought so."

Jin snorts. "You realise it doesn't help when I hear things like that?"

"Thanks to me you look pretty now, too."

"Oh great and powerful Nakamaru-sama, thank you so much for laying hands on this most unworthy of hair and-"

"Not that you weren't before." Nakamaru has to interrupt Jin before he really gets going. "So that's what made you like this? A throwaway comment from a friend?"

"It sounds kind of stupid when you put it that way." Jin stares straight ahead, like he's talking to some projection on the wall. "It didn't make me anything except self-conscious. I thought there had to be something wrong with me, and I was right."

"That's not it."

"Right, right; Kame's always telling me it's not weird, it's perfectly natural, doesn't mean there's something wrong with me. Sometimes I believe him."

"He usually knows what he's talking about; you should trust him."

"I do." Jin's eyes blink back into focus. "I need him to be right about this. About me. If he's not...I mean...you think it's weird, don't you?"

"I think everything you do is weird, but that doesn't mean I think it's wrong for you."

"Idiot." But Jin says it with affection, so Nakamaru knows he's not being serious. "Come on, let's find you something to wear that doesn't make you look ninety years old."

\-----

When Nakamaru turns up in a tight leather jacket, ripped jeans and a large white shirt with a scantily-clad blonde woman on the front and nary a diamond in sight, Kame decides there's no way he dressed himself. When Jin walks in right behind Nakamaru, Kame knows he was right.

"He didn't want me to look ninety years old," Nakamaru says, sounding resigned to his fate. "You try stopping him."

Kame offers him mock sympathy and a stiff drink. The latter is gratefully accepted; the former, not so much.

Jin's attire is something of a sight too. Kame's not sure if he's trying to make a statement but if so, it's a fairly bold one. He's wearing pale blue jeans with patterns embroidered down the side seams and on all the pockets in rainbow bright colours, tucked into knee-high black boots, shiny with silver buckles. Nothing Kame hasn't seen before, but the top hiding beneath the black puffer jacket is new - black, with spaghetti straps, underneath a translucent silver and pink mini-jacket that seems to float around Jin's shoulders. The same colour scheme pervades his accessories and make-up: the dark pink lipstick plumps his lips more than usual, and silver sparkles dance across his cheekbones under long black lashes, matching the hoops twinkling in both ears and the charm bracelet of music notes hanging from his left wrist.

And as for the hair...

"You guys got me a stripper!" Koki holds up a beer in triumph, grinning when he catches sight of Jin. "Aww, you shouldn't have..."

Jin smirks, flips him off and goes to help himself to a drink.

Ueda looks disappointed when he sees it's only Jin, though he perks up after taking a couple of incriminating cell phone photos of Nakamaru, who is trying hard to keep his jacket closed across the model's assets. Junno looks amiable enough but it's hard for Kame to tell what he thinks of Jin's appearance.

When everyone's sitting comfortably with a drink, Kame brings out the birthday cake on a tray. He's proud of the cake. The three layers are sandwiched together with chocolate cream and the whole thing is topped off with a flat layer of chocolate icing, decorated with sprinkles around the edges and 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY KOKI' piped in white icing in the centre. He's not quite sure how to cut it, admittedly, much less fit a slice in his mouth, but there are candles to attend to first, twenty-six of them arranged in a ring. (They would've been a heart, but he didn't want to give Koki ideas.)

When they sing 'Happy Birthday', Kame's the only one singing in tune, Junno's singing the NEWS song, Nakamaru's adding voice percussion, Ueda's flat and Jin's singing falsetto. Koki looks on from his spot on the couch, lording it over them with a self-satisfied smile till he's allowed to blow out the candles.

He manages twenty-five. Jin leans forward and blows out the twenty-sixth.

"Hey!"

"Just lending a helping hand to a friend who's now too old and too feeble to blow out all his candles in one go..."

"You're older than I am," Koki says. "What does that say about you?"

"That you should both quit smoking before you run out of puff," Ueda says.

Kame laughs at Koki and Jin's matching appalled faces and begins removing the candles so he can slice the cake. He stacks them carefully in a tub; Jin's idea of helping is to pluck them from the cake and throw them in without looking. Kame resolves to leave his slice for last.

Koki gets the first slice, of course, and Kame is almost embarrassed by his effusive praise. Koki's always doing things like that; he's come a long way from the scrappy little kid who hated Kame, hated KAT-TUN, and hated being their second 'T'. Kame's no stranger to having guys declare they love him on television, but the one he wants to hear it from barely speaks about him in public, and the rest...he can never be quite sure how they mean it. Koki's a good friend with a very obvious crush, but Kame doesn't think he has any plans to seriously pursue it.

At least, he hopes not, because he'd hate to have to break Koki's heart.

Ueda says he's only going to have a small slice at first, but ends up eating three. Nakamaru's trying to gain weight and declares himself owner of any leftovers. Junno asks if Kame takes requests, since his birthday is at the end of the month.

Jin picks daintily at his with a small fork, taking tiny, lady-like bites, until Koki calls him on it and he admits he's trying to avoid getting crumbs down his top, because he's practically glued into it as it is and it would be a nightmare to get them out.

"I'm sure we could help," Koki offers with a leer that would be more convincing if he didn't have icing all around his mouth.

"If you're going to do that, wait till I've gone," Ueda says. "If I wanted to see shirtless men, I'd go to the gym."

"Trust me," Nakamaru says, "you can't get him out of that top without a pair of scissors. It took both of us to get him into it in the first place!"

"Nobody's taking scissors to this." Jin crosses his arms across his chest, still holding the fork. "I bought it in America and I like it!"

"You went to America to have breast implants?" Junno says. "I don't think you can get those out with a pair of scissors..."

Kame's still holding his own fork when he points to Jin. "He means the shirt, which I have no idea how he's going to remove. Crowbar, maybe."

"Oh please," Jin says, smirking. "I had the same stripping lessons you did. I just don't do it much anymore."

"Good tactic," Kame says. "Now your fans scream if you so much as take your hat off - and you don't even do that much."

"They don't need to see my face to enjoy the singing and dancing." Jin shovels a large chunk of cake in his mouth and Kame knows there will be no more talk about the direction in which Jin's chosen to take his career.

"Dancing!" Koki snaps his fingers. "That's what we should be doing."

"You have filming tomorrow," Kame reminds him. "That's why we're just sitting around eating cake."

"If I turn up on set like this, I won't be able to move. Let's go dance it off for a while. It's not that late."

"I know, but-" Kame tries, but Koki interrupts him.

"Jin'll back me up; he's always ready to go to a club."

"Um..." Jin looks helplessly at Kame. "Can I borrow a shirt? I didn't bring a change with me."

"You should go like that," Koki says. "You're perfectly dressed for it."

"Not a chance." Jin shakes his head. "I can't go out in public like this. Why do you think I drove here?"

It finally clicks in Kame's head that Jin's only drinking soda. It makes sense, though. He's carrying that tiny handbag again and there's no way he managed to squeeze a change of clothing in there.

"Do you really think anyone's going to notice in a club?" Kame says. "If you run into anyone you know, just tell them you came straight from work or something."

Junno tries to help. "You could be one of your own dancers?"

"I'm not cute enough to be one of my dancers!"

Kame begs to differ but can't say so. "You've got five of us to hide behind, at least?"

"Yeah, but three of you wouldn't be any good for it," Jin says, and everybody laughs. "Does this mean you're actually volunteering yourself to go clubbing?"

"Don't make it sound like I never go." Kame has a social life, it just takes a backseat to work, and unlike Jin, who hates to be alone, Kame actually enjoys it. "We have different tastes, that's all."

"But since this is my night to celebrate, we're going to somewhere _I_ like," Koki says.

Kame has a bad feeling about this.

\-----

New Lex isn't exactly top of Kame's list of favourite nightspots. In fact, it's not even on the list. But it's like a second home to Jin - or possibly third, given how much time he spends in LA these days - and Kame thinks it would be a good idea for Jin to go there when he's all dressed up. If he can feel comfortable there, it'll go a long way towards boosting his confidence.

That's the only positive aspect Kame can see of this situation. Jin couldn't take them all in his car, so Ueda offered to go separately. An opportunity for escape, Kame thinks, but he's pleasantly surprised when Ueda meets them out front, jogging on the spot to keep himself warm. It's unlikely he'll stay long, though. Ueda likes to keep his private life to himself, but Kame's pretty sure it doesn't involve hanging out in clubs in Roppongi.

Despite his attire Jin gets recognised at the door, though nobody bats an eyelid. Tokyo is nothing if not a haven for eccentric dressers. He doesn't have to pay, which means neither do the rest of them, though they all still have to get their drinks tokens as normal. It'll be soft drinks for Jin all night unless he wants to leave his car, but Kame can order whatever he wants and he thinks alcohol will be essential for his survival. Being too short to make himself seen through the crowd at the bar, he hands Junno a token and asks him to get anything that's likely to make his liver curl up and die.

Jin stashes his little bag in the lockers by the stairs. Nakamaru looks like he'd like to hide inside a locker too, but settles for turning up the collar of his jacket, which he's trying to use to cover his T-shirt.

He needn't have bothered. Despite the videos playing along one wall and the coloured lights of glowsticks, it's dark inside the club and no one's paying any attention to the fluorescent girl flaunting herself on his chest. They're all too busy dancing.

Koki leads the way through the crowd to the VIP section, where a starstruck indie band suddenly decide to leave and free up a table. One of them bangs knuckles with him as he goes, and Kame thanks his lucky stars that Koki has such a diverse fanbase, willing to relinquish their nice, cosy corner. Now if only he can hide out here until it's time to leave...

Junno and Ueda materialise with the drinks, and Nakamaru downs half of his in one gulp before sliding as far into the corner as he can get. Kame follows at a more sedate pace, wishing he'd remembered to bring his cigarettes because he could really do with one right now. He inhales second-hand smoke, sweat and perfume and lets himself tune out. He can do this. He can let the music wash over him and just hang out in the corner, doing his own thing, and-

"Let's dance!" Jin says, grabbing him by the wrist. "We can't let Koki have all the fun!"

So much for the wallflower plan. Koki's already up and dancing with some pink-haired girl, doing his best to work off the chocolate cake. For a heartbeat Kame thinks Jin means for them to dance together, but together means everyone in the room, one seething, heaving mass of bodies contorting in time to the music. Kame finds it strange, not standing out in a crowd of dancers on the stage. One of many keeping the beat: it's easy to lose himself here.

Maybe that's why Jin's relaxing now.

Not so relaxed he doesn't notice Kame's being squashed, though. He steers them away from a trio of burly foreigners, over to the wall where photographs depict the club's memories through people. Everyone's been there one time or another. Kame finds himself looking for signs of Jin on the wall.

He finds the real Jin instead, standing between him and the horde of dancers, flushed and happy and more like himself than ever. This time he can't drink, so he dances.

"Okay?" Jin asks. He's not quite yelling but if the music suddenly stopped, he'd be audible outside.

"Fine!" It's too much work to speak in long sentences. "You?"

"Not bad! I've only seen three people I know and nobody close!"

That would also explain why he's stopped keeping his head down. The situation might not be to Kame's liking but there's no denying it's working out for Jin.

Kame breaks into a grin, which Jin returns with interest and takes as a sign that it's okay to throw himself back out there on the dancefloor, safe in his anonymity. Jin's space is immediately filled by one of the big Americans and the girl he's trying to dance with. When the girl's spiked heel almost goes through Kame's boot, he decides it's time to effect an escape. Their table can't be that far away.

\-----

Kame spends the better part of the next hour parked at the table, occasionally fighting his way through to the bar. He's got company: Nakamaru, after attempting to cut loose on the floor, comes back to wail that he's being stalked by a Russian model and that Kame has to save him from her.

"She even tried to follow me into the bathroom!" he says.

"Don't know any Russian, sorry."

Nakamaru hits him on the arm. "You're not helping. Besides, even if I knew Russian, I don't think she's taking no for an answer!"

They agree that the safest thing to do is stay put. Nakamaru faces the wall so his glowing shirt doesn't give him away. Stupid thing's like having a target painted on his chest.

Junno returns to the table long enough to set down an empty glass and inform them he's just had a message from Rena asking him to meet her. Koki's with him; he understands.

"Go see your girlfriend," he says, attempting to throw an arm around Junno's shoulders and missing. "It means a lot to me that you let us all come out on your birthday."

Junno looks bewildered. "My birthday?"

"Yeah. Happy birthday, man."

"And happy birthday to you too." Junno successfully disengages himself from the drunken octopus clamped round his waist. "See you guys later."

"Take me with you," Nakamaru begs.

"I didn't know you were into threesomes," Koki says. "Hey, I've got this great idea for _your_ birthday..."

Kame distracts Koki by passing him his own half-drunk beer and Junno makes his escape _sans_ Nakamaru, who bemoans his lot in life. Unfortunately neither of them can use the same excuse, and Kame feels like he can't leave until Jin does in case something happens. Jin's not drinking, which means he's less likely to say or do something stupid, but the consequences now are that much more serious. This is one of Jin's "safe" places, so if he encounters any kind of setback here, there's no telling how it will affect him.

Ueda's the next to leave. He doesn't even bother coming up with an excuse. "I feel like going for a run," he says. "Have a good weekend."

Koki accepts that one too, so Nakamaru tries his luck.

"I've got this essay I need to finish and I'm feeling kind of tired, so-"

"You need to get moving, get your blood flowing! Exercise is good for creativity!"

Poor Nakamaru gets dragged off to dance again, leaving Kame laughing by himself in the corner. He's not alone for long, though, because Jin returns for a break and sits down next to him to work on his Coke.

"You should dance more," Jin says.

"I kept getting hit by flying elbows."

"You what?" Jin shuffles closer so he can hear better.

Kame repeats himself with increased volume, but it's hard to talk when Jin's right beside him, pressed thigh-to-thigh. At that distance they should be whispering into each other's ears, not shouting. It's intimate but not, together in a private corner of a public place.

"We could find you a club specially for short people?"

In that case, Jin wouldn't be allowed. "Or I could wear platforms?" Kame suggests. "Not sure how well I'd be able to dance, but..." He trails off as he notices Jin's hair is coming loose. The clip on the right clings on for dear life while the braids it once held are flying free. "Stay still a sec."

"Huh?"

Kame removes the clip altogether and waves it in front of Jin by way of explanation, so Jin holds still for emergency haircare. The plaits themselves remain tight, thankfully, so no rebraiding is required, and it's a simple matter to pull them together in a bunch.

It's not so simple to pull away, to remove his hands from Jin's hair. He continues to fuss with it, stroking it under the guise of reshaping the upper braids to his liking. He can't do the same on the left unless they switch positions, which he does by boldly sliding himself over Jin's lap. If they were anywhere else he wouldn't try it but it's easier in the dark.

Jin squirms but doesn't protest when Kame lands on his other side. Changing positions doesn't do a thing to increase the distance between them. Kame takes the final handful of braids to run through his fingers, petting Jin the way he would a puppy until he realises he can't keep it up forever. Reluctantly he reattaches the clip, cups a hand around Jin's ear and breathes, "Fixed."

When he receives no response, he turns around to find Nakamaru staring at them with mournful eyes. "After all my hard work..."

\-----

Koki had agreed to call it a night after another round of 'dodge the Russian model', much to Nakamaru's relief, and Jin had dropped them all off at home. Kame had listened to the voice of common sense and not invited him in, given what had happened last time he'd been drinking around Jin. He'd like to avoid a repeat performance at all costs.

The weekend passes easily enough. He emails Koki with birthday greetings, receiving in return a photo of Nakamaru cringing away from a tall blonde woman who looks like she wants to devour him. For a model she doesn't dress very well, Kame thinks.

He doesn't hear from Jin, which is probably a good thing. Fixing a guy's hair? Fine. Petting a guy's hair? Fine if you happen to be in showbusiness. Crawling over a guy's lap so you can blatantly cosy up to him from a different angle? Fine if you have that kind of relationship, but they don't. He might as well just have thrown himself at Jin.

At least he can blame the alcohol. He consoles himself with the fact that if Jin had minded, he'd have said something. He's not one to stay quiet when he's annoyed, especially with his friends, with whom he has no barriers.

Work drives all thoughts of Jin from Kame's mind for a while because after a year's break from his usual winter drama slot, he's cast in _Split_ and spends his non-existent free time reading up about disassociative identity disorder. His character, Nishikawa Hikaru, is an earnest young police detective with a strong sense of justice and a quasi-flirtatious relationship with his partner, to be played by Kuroki Meisa in a way Sister Angela would never approve of.

When the pair are assigned to a special unit dedicated to catching the notorious art thief, Kage, Nishikawa makes catching Kage his obsession, lets it drive him to acts that fall in the grey area of the spectrum as he slowly becomes more and more like his shadow self.

But what Nishikawa doesn't realise is that he and Kage are one and the same.

Kame's relishing the chance to play a villain - his guest appearance in _Mr. Brain_ didn't really count - and Kage ought to do interesting things for his career. He's a man with a flexible sense of right and wrong, and no compunction about disposing of people who get in his way. He's smart, too, using all his skill to pull off intricate, complex thefts, throwing the occasional bone to the police to remove his competitors. Kage isn't a good guy, but he shares his body with a man who is, and Kame's interested to see what happens when the two personalities begin to merge. There's no limit to what he can do with a nice, juicy part like this.

It'll be another year of working through Christmas, probably, but it's not like he had plans, and he's missed acting. Maybe they'll eat KFC on the set and sing carols to each other during the breaks.

It'll mean a new single for KAT-TUN too - something dark, with a PV full of mystery - and there will be the usual promotion to do. Kame can't wait for all the hustle and bustle to begin.

When it does, his manager has a surprise for him. It's not something new for Johnny's, having a Twitter account for a drama role, but it's one of the few times anyone's suggested getting Kame to do anything that involves technology. He can fix televisions but social networking is not his strong point. "Kage" will drop hints to the police on his Twitter, titillating the viewers with his thoughts and opinions on the cases. His manager gives him the login details for the _splitshadow_ account, slaps him on the back, and tells him to have fun.

Kame takes one look at the website and calls Jin before he accidentally locks himself out of the account or something. When Jin finally stops laughing, he agrees to come over that evening to share his pearls of Twitter wisdom.

"The first thing you have to remember," he says when he arrives, "is that people are crazy. When your haters find out they have a way to communicate with you, they'll do it. They'll tweet insults at you in half-a-dozen different languages, they'll Photoshop pics and link you to them, they'll tell you- wait, you know what? Just don't look at your @ messages."

Kame has to wait for Jin to take a breath before he says, "Can you start by showing me where to log in?"

"Right." Jin exhales slowly. "Do you have beer? I think we've got a long night ahead of us."

They sit down at the table with Kame's laptop, which is mostly used for research, shopping, and all things baseball-related. He doesn't use it everyday, unlike Jin, who seems to be permanently glued to his gadget collection. Jin pops open a beer; Kame sticks with mineral water in case his subconscious gets any funny ideas. They're sitting on separate chairs and thus have a gap between them but he's taking no chances.

The first thing Jin does is make Kame change his password. "Your manager set this up, right? So you need to make sure no one but you can access the account. You don't want anyone tweeting anything strange."

"It's for a drama character - I'm only going to be tweeting strange things," Kame points out. "Does it matter?"

"Yes." Jin is adamant about this. "Make sure you don't forget the password. Oh, and don't make it anything obvious, like your dogs' names. There are lunatics out there who will try to guess it."

Kame finds it very strange, being lectured so seriously on such a trivial subject, but he supposes that having been doing this for almost three quarters of a year himself, Jin probably knows what he's talking about. They also change the password on the webmail address associated with the account, created solely for that purpose, and Jin declares himself satisfied when they've ensured that Kame has total control over it.

"Now we have to do something about that background," Jin says. "At least they gave you a DP."

"A what?"

" _Display picture_ ," Jin says in English, then explains in Japanese.

The picture's okay - Kame recognises his own silhouette - but Jin's not happy with the sparkly purple background.

"You need to put your own picture in here. What's your character into?"

"Robbery, murder, the usual."

"Helpful."

Kame shrugs. "You want me to call the writers and ask about this guy's taste in art?"

"Maybe we can put together some-" Jin cuts himself off when Kame gives him the "don't make me do anything involving graphics" face. "Do you have any pictures of moonlit nights?"

Kame has several, so they pick one to use. It's a night view from the roof of his building, Tokyo spread out below the moon's watchful eye, just ripe for a thief to go about his business.

"Are you allowed to start using this thing yet?"

"Not until next week," Kame says.

Jin thinks it over. "You don't have any followers yet, so it's okay to practise a little. We can just delete them afterwards."

"And followers are?"

"People who subscribe to your Twitter so they can read what you say." Jin points out the Following/Follower counts on the screen. They both say zero. "And you can follow people too, but I guess you won't be doing that since this is for a drama."

"So I could follow you?"

"It would drive the fangirls and our managers crazy," Jin says. "You should do it."

He shows Kame how to search for users on Twitter and click to follow them, then logs into his own email to show him the message he'll receive when people follow him.

 _Kage (@splitshadow) is now following your tweets (@Jin_Akanishi) on Twitter._

"When people follow me, am I supposed to follow them back?"

"It's a bad idea unless you actually know them. You can see if someone tweets at you, though, even if you don't follow them, so long as their account is unlocked." Kame's sure his face signals 'information overload', because Jin immediately adds, "Which your account is going to be, so don't worry about it. See, if someone writes a message using the 'at' symbol followed by your username, you can see it here."

Jin logs into his own account to show Kame some examples, and it doesn't escape Kame's notice that while his account is in Japanese, Jin's is in English. It's one thing to listen to him converse in English; it's quite another to watch him navigate so casually through sites in his second language without even pause for thought. Jin may say and do some dumb things, sometimes, and his Japanese can be very hit and miss, but Kame doesn't know how anyone can ever think he's stupid. He shows Kame tweets he's exchanged in Spanish with Shirota Yuu and Kame feels like he could burst with pride, even though he has no clue what any of it means.

"See? Your own tweets and those from the people you follow show up in your timeline here." Most of the people Jin follows tweet in English. "If you're following people who are following each other and they have a conversation that doesn't include you, you can see it anyway."

Kame holds up a hand. "Slow down. Assume I'm not going to be following anyone. This is for work."

"Sure it is." Jin gives him a sly smile. "You'll get your own eventually; you know you will."

"I just want to know how to make it work without breaking it, that's all."

Jin looks less than convinced, but he teaches Kame about hashtags, and retweeting, and adding links to tweets. And most importantly, how to delete tweets in case he makes a mistake.

"I do that all the time," he confesses. "If it's just, like, one little typo, you can use an asterisk with a correction."

It's like the session he had with Nakamaru, learning how to use Skype, except that Nakamaru had given him a set of nicely illustrated instructions with bullet points and highlights. Jin rattles through things at his own pace and insists on telling him everything he could ever possibly want to know about Twitter - most of which he will likely never use.

Still, there's something fun about the idea of taking his character out into the world this way. He's done j-webs in character before, but he's never been able to see what the fans think of them. Now he can get immediate responses.

"Can I see what fans are tweeting at you?" he asks, and before Jin can stop him, he clicks on the mentions.

After skimming through them, he wishes he hadn't. There's a lot of support, from what he can make out, but also some tweets that are definitely designed to hurt. Some of them are about his appearance and a couple mention Lex. Evidently, word's out about what Jin was wearing that night.

"You always attract this much hate?"

Jin's face is locked down tight but his eyes are sad. "It comes and goes. I ignore them."

It's obvious it comes at a cost, though. "So a bunch of idiots have some crazy ideas about you. That doesn't make them right," Kame says, offering an encouraging smile.

"Even the ones who say I'm looking more like you these days?"

"Is that supposed to be a compliment or are they insulting us both?"

Jin shrugs. "I'm not replying to ask them. This is why I said not to look. It's great being able to communicate with my fans like this but it leaves me exposed, too. I don't want that to happen to you."

"I'm used to brushing off hate." How many times has Kame come under fire for his drama ratings, as if he were carrying the whole thing on his shoulders? Sadly, too many to count. He hopes the new one will be different. "I'm not letting it get to me anymore."

"If your weight drops to 40kg again I am going to personally report anyone who messages you with hate as a spammer."

Kame's amused by the mental image of Jin tapping furiously away on his iPad, reporting spammers one after the other with the same fierce concentration he uses when trying to learn new dance steps. "My knight in baggy armour."

Jin grins and bows his head. "I live to serve."

"You live to do a lot of things. Serving isn't one of them."

There's no way Jin can refute that charge, so he doesn't even try. He teaches Kame one final element of Twitter - how to block users.

"Since you're public they'll still be able to see your tweets, but they can't follow you," he says. "I only found it because I accidentally blocked Josh once."

"So I could block people with names like 'hatekamenashi', then?"

"Block anyone you like. You're playing a bad guy, right?"

"Yeah. I shouldn't just block people who get in my way, I should hunt them down and kill them." Kame sighs in contentment. "They finally let me audition for a villain's role - one with a dual personality, at that. I haven't been able to play anyone this complex since-" He stops there because _Nobuta wo Produce_ is still something of a touchy subject.

"Since Shuuji," Jin finishes for him. "But I think most of your roles have had something special about them. Maybe not so much in that wine series..."

"Even Shizuku had his moments. But if _BANDAGE_ was your chance to show what you can do, maybe this is mine."

Jin turns completely around on his chair so his whole body faces Kame, all joking forgotten. "Don't kill yourself for this role," he says. "I know you'll put everything into it because you always do, but you've got nothing to prove. Everyone already knows what you can do - everyone who counts, anyway."

Mineral water notwithstanding Kame feels tipsy now, drunk on happiness and nostalgia. They've had times where they can barely exchange civil words and times when it would take a crowbar to separate them, but somehow Jin always comes through, standing up for him when he least expects it. That's the determined, confident teenage boy he fell for all those years ago, the one who sang and danced his way to stardom and dragged his slow turtle friend along for the ride until they drew level. Sometimes one overtakes, and then the other catches up again, but if it hadn't been for Jin Kame doubts he'd even still be in the race - baseball would've lured him back for good.

Having a friend to share it with makes all the difference, though.

"And I suppose you count?"

"I always count," Jin says smugly, and whether they're on speaking terms or not, that's true as far as Kame's concerned.

He's not sure there will ever be a time when Jin doesn't count. Even if he goes away and marries some American girl, has the babies he so desperately wants and starts a whole new life for himself elsewhere...even then, he'll still count. Sometimes Kame takes a look at his own feelings and laughs at himself for not tossing them out like so much waste. He's kept them for years, nurtured them, locked them away in the back of his mind where they can't escape and make him say or do things that will give him away.

It's too late for that now. As much as he'd like to put them back in the box, he can't quite bring himself to do it. If Jin hadn't kissed him back, maybe. If he'd pushed Kame away immediately instead of clutching his hips. All it takes is one insignificant hope to keep those feelings alive.

"You okay?" Jin asks. "You're spacing out. Overwhelmed by modern technology?"

Kame feels his face grow warm, realises he's been staring at Jin and hopes his expression wasn't too sappy. He has to stay focussed.

"Just thinking about the kind of things I could tweet," he says quickly. "I guess I'll have to keep it in character."

"This is why you need to get one of your own," Jin says. "I ask people questions all the time - then I risk looking at my replies. Things like the music genres they like and stuff. Ballads or hip-hop. Sweet or spicy."

"Armani or Diesel." Kame starts to glaze over again. "I could block anyone who gave me the wrong answer."

Jin and fashion are not always on speaking terms, even if he is quite attached to his A&F hoodies. "What's the _right_ answer?"

"Burberry."

"Unfair!"

"I wouldn't block you. You can be my number one follower."

Alas, that honour has been denied Jin, as they discover when Kame refreshes to find he's been followed by a beauty shop account, selling products guaranteed to banish the shadows from under his eyes.

"How does it know?" he wonders while Jin blocks it, logs into his own account and follows Kame before anyone else can sneak in.

"There." Jin's satisfied now. "I'm your number one."

Always, but Kame's not about to say that. "And I'm your number...hundred and fifty thousand or something. Not that I'll understand half the stuff you tweet anyway."

"And you'll be in character, so I probably won't understand _anything_ you tweet."

"You'll just have to watch to keep yourself informed," Kame says. "Same as everyone else."

"If I'm in the country," Jin says airily, so Kame punches him in the arm. "I'll...buy the DVDs afterwards?"

"I bought yours." Kame points across the room to his DVD collection. There's an entire shelf dedicated to supporting his friends, which means he owns a lot of dramas he's never gotten around to finishing but it looks good whenever someone comes over.

Jin gets up to examine the collection for himself, occasionally passing comment on the contents (he still hasn't forgiven Nakamaru for inflicting the _RESCUE_ -training episode of _Cartoon KAT-TUN_ on him), and works his way down to the next shelf. He groans when he finds the _Glee_ boxsets.

"What?" Kame says. "You should support it too - hasn't one of your dancer friends been in it a couple of times?"

"I can't get away from it, Kame. The show's taken over the US. I think it's trying to take over the world. When I'm in the States, every time I walk into a store there's nothing but _Glee_. It's all over the charts and everything."

"Being popular doesn't make it bad."

"I didn't say it was bad, I just-"

"Have you even seen an episode?"

Jin shakes his head, a sheepish smile on his face. "Um...Aubree showed me a clip where she was dancing. That's about it."

"Then I think it's time you watched an episode." And Kame knows exactly which one to show him. Jin's a Lady Gaga fan; he should appreciate the music at the end, even if he decides he hates everything else.

Jin agrees to suffer through an episode on the condition that Kame feeds him. Kame makes them both omurice, squeezing their names on the top in ketchup. He used to try doing pictures, but his drawing skills with a ketchup bottle are no better than with a pencil, so he doesn't bother anymore. He can manage a heart when he makes it for his niece and that's good enough.

They watch with the subtitles on - mostly for Kame's benefit, since he doubts there's anything in the show that Jin's not going to be able to understand. (In terms of language, at least. Concepts, he's not so sure about.) And it saves Kame naming all the characters, too.

Not that Jin absorbs any of the names. "That guy would never make it in Johnny's," he says when Finn accidentally breaks Rachel's nose with his horrible dancing.

Kame agrees. "When we break noses, we break them on purpose."

"I thought KAT-TUN were trying to move away from the tough guy image?"

"Not intentionally. Maybe we need to do CMs for more macho products."

"Power drills," Jin says. "Tow-trucks. Cement mixers."

"Because your average television viewer is always on the look out for a shiny new cement mixer."

Jin dissolves into giggles and admits that even KAT-TUN might have a hard time selling construction equipment.

He stops laughing when he sees Rachel letting herself be talked into a nose job. "Why's she doing that?"

"Because she doesn't like the way she looks," Kame explains. "She thinks if she has a nose like Quinn's - the blonde girl - she'll be prettier."

"But she's pretty just the way she is!"

"You know that, I know that, and pretty much everyone around her knows that - but she's going to take some convincing."

Rachel's not the only one with something about herself that she perceives as a flaw, as Jin soon discovers. McKinley's glee club is full of quirky characters, some nicer than others. Santana's not one of Kame's favourites, though he started liking her more towards the end of season two, but Jin likes her immediately.

"She's hot, she's tough, and sassy as hell," he says. "What's not to like?"

Kame thinks this says a lot about Jin's taste in women. "She's in love with her best friend." He points out Brittany on the screen. "Some people don't like that."

Jin gives Brittany an appraising glance. "She's got good taste. Please tell me she's not seriously hooking up with that Carrot-ski guy."

"Karofsky! And no, they're just using each other, don't worry."

"I'm not worried," Jin says, frowning. "But I don't like bullies."

There's a big difference between the kind of bullying Jin and his friends inflict on each other and the kind he'd had to deal with in school. It's a long time ago, now, but Kame can't help wondering how Jin would've turned out if he'd been schooled in America. A high school jock, wandering the halls with a cheerleader hanging on his arm? A singer like Kurt, casting spells with his voice? Or would he have been like Mike Chang (if Mike could sing), with a foot in both camps?

When Kurt's boyfriend Blaine turns up to sing to Kurt on the steps of the school and the two embrace for the camera, Jin asks, "Is everyone on this show gay?" He's not sneering, or asking in a derogatory way, merely curious.

"Only a few people, but it's still a surprising number for a mainstream American show, isn't it? You don't get that in Japan much." Kame tries to keep the bitterness from his voice, without success.

"Is...is that why you watch it?"

"It's why I tried it, yeah - heard about it from a friend - but when I started watching, I found a lot of good reasons to keep going." On the screen, Kurt breaks into song and Kame smiles. "That's one of them. Doesn't he sound incredible?"

Jin has to admit that he does, and actually stops talking long enough to listen. He pulls out his iPhone to identify the song and Kame tells him before the search completes. With all the hip-hop and rap on Jin's playlists, sometimes Kame forgets he's got fairly broad musical tastes. As teenagers they watched _The Wizard of Oz_ together and Jin sang along with every single song, mangling the English (not that he cared, at that age) and teasing Kame about being short enough to play one of the Munchkins. Jin's voice has changed since then; 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' would sound different now but Kame has no doubt it would still be as sweet. They've been over that rainbow together, the two of them, even if it's not the same rainbow everyone else thinks it is.

Emma's session with the therapist, brief though it is, has Jin looking decidedly uncomfortable and Kame has to pause to give him some background on the fruit-cleaning. As a country, Japan doesn't really know what to do with mental illness - keep quiet, tuck it away, conform and do your duty to society without making yourself different - and it jars him sometimes watching Western shows where it's often out in the open. It's not that he doesn't know anyone personally - he wasn't kidding when he reeled off a whole long list of disorders in the agency to Jin - but almost no one ever comes out and says it.

Not like Emma finally does at the end, with her 'OCD' T-shirt, and Kame pays close attention to Jin's expression when he sees the club gather for their 'Born This Way' number. He's mouthing the lyrics, and he smiles and nods when he sees Finn's 'CAN'T DANCE' shirt. Kame appreciates Kurt's 'LIKES BOYS' shirt, but while it's something he's struggled with in himself it's not something he wants to change. None of the cast are wearing a T-shirt that fits Jin's particular situation but that's not the point, and Kame hopes he gets it anyway.

He does. "You're about as subtle as a sledgehammer, Kame. You know that?"

"So what would _your_ T-shirt say?"

"'CONFUSED'."

"That must be your equivalent of 'GINGER'. Try again?"

"'HORRIBLY CONFUSED'."

Kame sighs. Nothing's ever easy when it comes to Jin. "Confused about feeling like a girl?"

"Not really. I mean, yeah, but it's...um..." Jin licks his lips; a flush spreads across his cheeks. "Forget it."

Forget it? Not likely, but Kame doesn't press. He's intrigued because it looks like Jin's taken a step or two unaccompanied, hopefully in the right direction, and even if he's confused he appears to be more confident. Maybe being dressed up at Lex helped his progress along that mental path. It's what they've been working towards.

Kame's proud but at the same time, a little sad. This has brought them closer together in so many ways - what happens when Jin doesn't need him anymore? When he figures out how to live with himself just the way he is, how to make his dreams and his reality match up? No more pretend dates, no more sharing of secrets.

Or maybe not, because Kame's in this up to his neck and there's no way he can walk away. There's no predicting how this will all turn out.

"What about your T-shirt?" Jin asks. "What would it say?"

Kame licks his lips, hopes his eyes don't give too much away when he looks at Jin and says, "Same as yours."


End file.
